TOP TEAM – Barnstable High School’s Future Problem Solver team of Blake Blaze, Katrina Malakhoff, Talya Perper and Dan Anthony shares a moment following the International Competition with coach Nancy Aborn. The team placed 11th in the world in team competition in the Senior Division.

Future Problem Solvers win big at Internationals

Call Barnstable High School student Kim Beatty an over-achiever and she grins. The same goes for fellow students Katrina Malakhoff, Talya Perper, Blake Blaze and Dan Anthony.

Why do they grin? Over-achieving has served them well, and they have the accolades to prove it.

The quintet are part of Barnstable’s Future Problem Solvers and prior to the end of this school year, enjoyed significant accomplishments in the FPS International Competition at Michigan State University.

Beatty, competing as an individual, placed second in the world in the Senior Division, and teammates Malakhoff, Perper, Blaze and Anthony placed 11th in the world in team competition, also in the Senior Division.

This was the first time in the history of the program that Barnstable has achieved such a high level of success. Nancy Aborn, program coach, attributes it to the students’ willingness to work hard.

“I had a student win at state level before, but I’ve never had one place as high as Kim,” said Aborn of Beatty, who will be a senior in the fall. “That’s enormous. I nearly fell off the bleachers when she won. I had tears in my eyes. It knocked my socks off.”

Aborn also had high praise for the team, each of whom just completed their sophomore year.

“They have a very high level of thought,” she said. “To have sophomore’s take that top spot is unusual. They are highly motivated.”

The Future Problem Solvers is part of Barnstable’s Gateway Program for gifted learners. FPS engages students in creative problem solving by fostering critical and creative thinking skills, and encourages students to reflect on the future.

Each season the students are presented with complex problems on globally significant issues such as child labor or global warming. Their job is to ferret out problems within each issue and then come up with solutions.

“You think in a different way,” said Beatty, who has been part of the program since sixth grade. “You have to really think about a lot of things so you can make different connections.”

“It broadens your own knowledge,” said Perper, who also began participating in FPS in sixth grade.

Ironically, while the students are capable of deep thinking, explaining why they enjoy FPS is a challenge.

“Why not?” asked Blaze.

“It’s not as academic as regular school classes,” said Perper. “It’s a lot more creative.”

For teams and individuals FPS is as much about solving problems as it is the experiences competing. This year the team traveled to Michigan State University for the International Competition where they met and made connections with teams from around the world, while listening to a myriad of solutions to various problems.

“The different categories increase your global awareness,” said Malakhoff. “They’re not just relevant to today, but to the future as well.”

“It’s an opportunity to meet with new people and to see the differences in your thought processes, creativity, and originality,” said Anthony. “Once you get to Internationals, the diversity is huge.”

Yet even with diversity comes familiarity. While in Michigan the team had the opportunity to interact with a team from Alaska who taught them an Alaskan teen slang word, jabe.